This invention generally relates to machines that are used to suture, swage and package surgical needles. More specifically, the invention relates to procedures for operating those machines, or for controlling various operations on those machines.
Machines have recently been developed that automatically suture, swage and package surgical needles; and, for example, such machines are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,568,593, 5,495,420 and 5,487,212. Generally, in the operation of these machines, unsutured needles are fed to the machines, and indefinite lengths of suture, taken from spools or other suitable supplies, are inserted into recesses or openings in the needles. The needles are swaged in the areas of those recesses or openings to secure the connections between the sutures and the needles, the sutures are cut to preset lengths, and the needles are packaged.
These machines have proven to be highly valuable, and they effectively produce large numbers of excellent quality, packaged, sutured needles. Moreover, these needles are produced very economically on a large scale, high speed, mass production basis.
These machines are quite complex. Each machine has a multitude of work stations; and, in operation, the needles, or groups of needles, are moved through the work stations, one station at a time, and each work station is used to perform one or more specific tasks. Each work station may itself be a comparatively complex assembly, or group of assemblies, of moving parts.
In addition, it is important that the operations of the work stations be coordinated so that each station completes its assigned task or tasks before the work product is moved to the next work station. Achieving this needed coordination is complicated by several facts. First, the machines operate at high speeds; and, for example, each station may have less than one second to perform a series of tasks. Second, over time, the length of time that a particular work station needs to complete its particular task or tasks may change due to, for instance, normal wear of the machine parts at the work station.